Spiced Ground Beef Gozleme with Maasdam

What is it about winter that makes me want to snack and eat meals consisting of sandwiches? A bite of this, a bit of that and pause; then start all over again. No, I don't want a plate of protein, veg and carbs. I want that leftover turkey coated in freshly cracked black pepper, slathered with whole grain mustard and stuffed into a cheesy toasted sandwich. Stuffed parathas? I'm down with that. Hawawshi? Yes to grease! Quesadillas? I'm not one to say no. So join me on my binge and make some gozleme stuffed with spiced ground beef and melted Maasdam. 

[This recipe was developed for Frico.]

Spiced Ground Beef Gozleme with Maasdam

3 cups of all-purpose flour 

3/4 of a standard 110g small yogurt cup

1 teaspoon of salt

2 tablespoons of olive oil

Water, as needed

6 slices of Maasdam cheese

2 tablespoons of butter

500 grams of ground beef

1 teaspoon of lemon juice

1 teaspoon of ground coriander

1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon 

1/2 cup of finely chopped onions

1 tablespoon of finely chopped fresh mint

1/2 cup of roughly chopped fresh coriander

1 teaspoon of black pepper

Salt, to taste

Melted butter, for cooking

Melt the butter in a large pan and sauté the onions until lightly caramelised then add the ground spices and stir for a minute before adding the ground beef. Season the mixture with salt and pepper then cook on medium heat until the beef cooks and browns. Stir in the lemon juice, fresh mint and coriander and set aside to cool. 

In a large bowl, combine the flour, salt, yogurt and olive oil and knead until it comes together. If it is still dry, add a teaspoon of water at a time until it comes together. Knead for 10 minutes until smooth. Cover with a moist towel and set aside for 20-30 minutes. 

Take a small ball of the prepared dough, dust it with flour and roll it out into a circle. Add 2 large tablespoons of the beef mixture and cover with half a slice of Maasdam cheese. Coat the edges of the dough with a little water. 

Take the edges of the dough and begin pleating the edges bringing them together in the centre to seal the gozleme. Twist the pleated edges and pinch off the extra dough that has gathered. Place the newly sealed side on the bottom and press it to flatten with a light hand. Dust with flour and roll out into a circle. 

Heat a pan until hot and cook the gozleme on both sides brushing lightly with melted butter. Flip once or twice until both sides are cooked well. Serve hot. 

Banana-Mixed Nut Espresso Smoothie

I was never one to turn down cake, especially if I was alone with it; if I was able to bite into its soft crumb with my gaping mouth that struggles to keep the frosting off my nose. On other days, it is the butt of a baguette with salted butter and a sticky glob of honey, scarfed down in seconds until there is none. 

It has been weeks. Three of them. No sugar, no yeast, only discipline. Surprisingly, at least to me, I am a happier human. I have more energy. I smile more often. It almost feels like a better side of myself has decided to drop by. 

On a Saturday, I dropped by the farmer's market at Arkan where I ran into these ladies running a branded booth, Fino's, that made all kinds of nut butters. For a moment in which I moped, I was told that they add honey to their products. A little heavy-hearted, I asked a question; the kind of question that would normally irritate me. 

Out loud, higher pitched voice: "Do you have anything that is unsweetened? No sugar? No honey? Nothing?"
Old Me to New Me: "Are you really turning into that woman on a diet/with an allergy/that can't accept a product the way it is and buy or walk away?"

But it turns out that people are nice sometimes (or maybe I need to socialize more often) and that these ladies do cater to my selfish needs. I ended up with a mixed nut butter; dense, smooth, rich, clean, good. I'm sold.  

Banana Espresso Smoothie
You'll need:
400 grams of frozen sliced bananas
2 1/2 heaped tablespoons of mixed nut (almond, hazelnut, cashew) butter
2 shots of espresso (Substitute: 1 1/4 tablespoons of espresso powder)
1 1/2 cups of milk
7-10 ice cubes, depending on the size
Honey to sweeten, optional (I did not use any so will be unable to give a measure.)

Blend, espresso, bananas, milk, mixed nut butter and ice. Serve.

Chocolate Drizzle Cake

It's about time I get back to posting regularly. This is attempt #1. 

Since my husband started cooking almost daily with me, I have found less of a need to share.

This does not suit food blogging. The purpose is to share, Sarah. So here we go. We've got chocolate cake. It's good. It's airy. It feels like it has no calories in it. It does. Many calories. And pockets of chocolate. Pray for your hips. 

Chocolate Drizzle Cake

You'll need: 

200 grams of unsalted butter, softened

200 grams of caster sugar

80 grams of melted milk chocolate

1 tablespoon of milk

140 grams of all-purpose flour

60 grams of cocoa powder

2 teaspoons of baking powder

4 large eggs, separated

A pinch of salt

2 drops of vinegar

Begin by preheating your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Grease a 20 cm round baking tin and line it with baking paper. 

Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa together and set aside. 

In a large bowl, cream your butter and sugar together until light and fluffy using a stand mixer or electric beater. 

Add the egg yolks and milk and mix until combined.

Mix in the combined dry ingredients then the melted chocolate. 

Whip your egg whites in a sepatate bowl with a pinch of salt.*

Start whisking the egg whites on low speed at first to get smaller and more stable bubbles in your foam. 

Add the vinegar and continue to beat the egg whites continuously until you get stiff peaks. 

Fold the egg whites into the cake mixture carefully. Don't fold too much or you'll end up with a deflated batter. 

Pour your cake batter into the baking tin and bake for 30-40 minutes or until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Leave to cool then remove from the baking tin.

*Make sure your egg whites are at room temperature. Make sure your bowl and utensils are clean and oil-free. 

For the ganache:
1 cup of heavy cream
1 ½ cup of chocolate chips

To prepare the ganache, heat the heavy cream in a saucepan over medium heat until it comes to a boil. Remove from heat and pour in the chocolate chips. Stir until completely combined and glossy. Allow the ganache to cool before pouring over cake.

Zebra Cake Turned Biscotti

I seem to fall into a pattern; one that I try to come to terms with, adjust to. It starts off with a quick job that drives me to run for an amount of time on what seems like the positive energy of this world compounded. Work happens in the midst of this; success comes in bursts. Later as it ends, I become harsher, a cracked heel. It is over and in some way, I too am over and worn out. I will sleep for days, read for hours, approach my kitchen out of necessity and watch food shows out of habit but no particular interest.  

A while later, I return after my hips have stretched and I have inhaled a large but untold number of biscuits, store-bought and homemade (not our home but another maybe mother or mother in law). Then when they are all gone I become biscuit-desperate, I make my own. Only then do I realize that I missed what I do. I missed my kitchen. I missed me.    

 Zebra Biscotti
(Adapted from BBC Food)

You'll need:
butter, to grease
4 large eggs
250 grams of granulated sugar
100 ml of milk
250 ml of sunflower oil
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
475 grams of self-raising flour
1 teaspoon of baking powder
25 grams of cocoa powder

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Butter a 23 cm cake tin. Crack your eggs and pour your sugar into a large mixing bowl. Pour in the milk, oil and vanilla extract and mix with a handheld electric whisk for a minute. Add 175 grams of your self-raising flour and whisk again until smooth. 

In a separate bowl, pour half of your mixture. Whisk in 1/2 a teaspoon of baking powder and 175 grams of flour and set aside. In the other bowl (the first bowl), mix in the cocoa powder, 125 grams of flour and the other 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder. 

In your cake tin, spoon two tablespoons of plain cake mix into the center then spoon two tablespoons of the chocolate mixture in the center and on top of the plain cake mix. Continue to do this until both cake mixes have been used up. You'll end up with alternate rings of cake mix in the tin. 

Bake in your oven for 40 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven, turn the cake out onto a wire rack and cool. Once cool, have a slice then place the cake onto a chopping board. Cut the cake into thick straight slices and arrange the soft cake, one side down, onto a baking sheet. Bake for around 15 minutes in a 190 degree Celsius preheated oven until they reach a light golden color. Transfer the biscotti onto a wire rack and cool completely before storing in an airtight container. 

Kahk for a guest post

Yasmeen over at Wandering Spice had asked me to guest post for her while she was busy getting married. For this post, she asked me to focus on Middle Eastern dishes or ones that were wedding-related. I chose both and used a simple enough recipe for Kahk, an Egyptian biscuit/cookie that's dusted in powdered sugar and is a symbol of celebration in our big, beautiful country. For the recipe, please visit Yasmeen's blog. 

Jam Cakes & Wild Food

As featured in The Egypt Monocle

“What are those?” I asked, looking down at my sneakers, at the stains beneath them sprawled over the floor of my friend’s garage, free of cars and quietly enclosed behind the looming gates of their villa. “I can’t remember their name,” Jinan shrugged, “but we can eat them.”

Away from today’s trends of foraging for plants we can eat, I hesitated at the notion back in 1994. “Are you sure?” I said making way for the burgundy stains to show themselves, to reassure my insecure self that they were ingestible as she comforted me — 10-year-old to 10-year-old.

I, after all, belonged to the supermarket generation of expatriate Abu Dhabi — one that did not see fresh markets except on our trips back home to our respective countries. Things were delivered, clean; the entirety of it had to be deemed safe before reaching our homes.

Popping it into my mouth, street dust and all, I smiled as it burst and started collecting more of these little bumpy purple gems with my foraging friend. Rinsing them in tap water and setting them down on the floor, we surrounded the bowl, descending on it to consume the fruit forbidden for us to pick up off the ground in vacant garages.

For years, I thought that what I had secretly shared with Jinan were blackberries. Only later did I find out that these were mulberries, grown in our region, sprouting high up on smooth-stemmed trees, seemingly black in the shade, plump and sugary. Blackberries on the other hand are grown on thorny vines, round and fragile-skinned, more uniform and smaller. The fact is that most people cannot differentiate between them and these days, most kids at first instinct would tell you that the blackberry is a phone and not a fruit that stains the spot it falls on.

I remember watching the stain on my fingers spread, creeping further on my skin, leaving tangible memories for me to take home, for me to ask my mom what those beautiful berries are called.

“Toot,” she said and so I trailed through my childhood calling them “toot” unable to understand that we Egyptians call most berry-looking berries “toot” with the exception of strawberries, holding a special place in our hearts.

“Blackberry jam” I read today on the jar’s label — “toot shami” neatly typed in Arabic. We as a market, still remain confused, unable to determine the genus of the plants around us. “Toot shami” were in fact Levantine mulberries, juiced in the hotter months by the sellers on the streets of Damascus for passersby to quench their thirst. I do not know what to do about this problem of misidentifying ingredients except to single them out, to make things easier for the interested to know.

I am lucky to live in one of Cairo’s gated communities but find that not many actually use the sprawling gardens away from the children’s playground. While walking our dog, I’ve come across ingredients lying around, often growing out of control. I’ve spotted a fully grown button mushroom but did not eat it out of fear that I picked the wrong kind. Instead, I pulled it out of the ground, broke it in two and examined it; feeling the same anxious excitement I first did with that tall mulberry tree. What I have managed to pick regularly is fresh basil for my caprese salads and saucy pastas.

I can barely even call myself an amateur forager but I’m curious to know if our gardens are full of edible wild plants that might serve our weak fine dining scene well, changing the way Egyptians perceive their weeds. If René Redzepi of Noma, chef of the best restaurant in the world 2010, 2011 and 2012, can deep fry moss and roast lettuce to make juice, it’s about time someone steps up to the plate to dig up the resources around us that have long been neglected. I wait eagerly for the day one of our restaurants, old or new, serves something intelligent, inspiring and wholly ours. Until then, I’ll keep on searching for the discrepancies and point out the correct names and origins of our region’s food.

Mulberry-Strawberry Jam Cake

You’ll need
1 stick of unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups of sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups of cake flour, sifted
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
3 tablespoons of mulberry jam (Toot shami, often marked as blackberry jam)
3 tablespoons of strawberry jam
Icing sugar, to dust

Butter a round cake pan and dust with flour. Tap out the excess flour and discard. In medium-sized bowl, sift together the flour and the salt. Combine the cream and vanilla in a cup and set aside.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the butter and sugar and whisk at high speed until pale, light and fluffy. Begin to add the eggs one at a time making sure each one is incorporated before the addition of another. Beat hard for two minutes until it begins to slightly rise in volume. Add the flour in three batches alternating with the cream. Begin with the flour and end with the cream. Mix just until all is incorporated. Pour the thick batter into your greased pan and smooth out the top. Dust each dollop of jam with flour before adding it to the top of the cake. Once done, swirl the jams around with a knife. Pop into a cold oven at 175 degrees Celsius and bake for a little over an hour (approx. 65 minutes). Remove from the oven. Cool before turning out of the pan. Slice; dust with icing sugar and an extra spoon of jam of your choice. Serve.  

Finding Solace in Brownies

Featured in The Egypt Monocle

I was sitting on the floor of our apartment on the 21st floor. Sliding the balcony's glass door open, I let Malaysia's humidity touch our skin; my stepkids, me, barefoot. "Like this?" Youssef asked, sitting in his camouflaged t-shirt and mismatched shorts, as I took photo after photo to post for you to see, here. "I want to stir the brownies now, Sarah. It's my turn," Talia chirped at first, her voice quietly deepening, tensing up. "Only if Sarah lets me take a photo while you stir," Youssef teased. 

Placing the camera around his neck, watching him secure it in his hands, my stepson had grown from the three year old that I had first spent time with on a boat cruising down the Nile. 
   
And then it happened what it was that happened until we reach this time of year, his 10th birthday. But we are not there to see it, to see him. Not his dad, not his grandma, not me. This is our law, Egypt. This is the law that allows mothers to deny fathers their right to spend time with their children, to hear their voices, to watch them grow - become hot-headed teenagers with sex drives. 

What if the father, after succumbing to court, has finally received a court order to see his child? He sees them (if the mother brings them) in the presence of the mom and a designated official from the government. All that's missing is a glass wall. Of course, all of us on the father's side of the family are in no way entitled to know the children; exceptions may be made for grandmothers if their sons are away but stepmothers? Me? Never.

Little did I know that day on the Nile that I, who was not invited to his birthday before becoming his father's wife, would not be able to speak to him again on his birthday five years into being his stepmother. And so it stays, all of us in one city, all of us learning to adapt to a situation we have been forced into, all for own reasons. I hope you have a beautiful birthday, Youssef. You are on our minds today and I wish you were here to make (or eat) these brownies with us.       

Pistachio-Milk Chocolate Brownies 

(Adapted from Epicurious)

You'll need: 

100 grams of unsalted butter

230 grams of milk chocolate, chopped

1 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract

3/4 cup of brown sugar

2 large eggs

3/4 cup of all purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon of salt

A handful of pistachios, chopped

A dash of sea salt

Preheat oven to 170 degrees Celsius. Butter and flour a 20 cm pan (8x8"). Melt butter and chocolate in a saucepan over low heat, continuously stirring until smooth. Cool until lukewarm. In a separate bowl, mix together the brown sugar, eggs and vanilla then slowly pour in half of the chocolate until the mixture is glossy. Add the flour and ½ teaspoon of salt then half of the pistachios. Mix well, beating hard, to incorporate. Stir in the remaining half of chocolate and spread the batter in a pan and sprinkle with the rest of the pistachios and sea salt. Bake for approximately 25 minutes.

A blueberry cake and flashes of color

As featured in The Daily News Egypt

I grew up wearing shades of watermelon, tangerine and aqua; colors I was taught by my mother. In our home, there was never use of the unadorned word blue, only baby blue, navy blue, royal blue and petrol. This is how she saw the world and what drove us, my sister and I, to look out for new colors and to use them regularly; compelling color names like vermillion and viridian were the winners where I was concerned.

Only later did I notice that the everyday brown never made an appearance in our house. The closest we had gotten to finding something “brown” in our closets or rooms was in fact a cross between terra cotta and rust. When winter would come and the city’s people would shed their summer spirit to shroud themselves in tones of wet sand and dusty leaves, my mother would be the lady crossing the street in the scarlet coat.     

 

On a clear day in Abu Dhabi, she took me, her newly turned eleven year old, shopping. Enthusiastically, I picked up a brown button-down dress and asked her what she thought, hoping that she would agree that it was the dress for me. “I don’t like brown,” she said as she walked a few steps ahead to lift up a dusty rose blouse, delicate and demure.

Soon after my university years, I took a trip alone to Abu Dhabi to reconnect with friends and the city I had seen solely through the biased eyes of my childhood. There, I bought a fitted brown t-shirt and several other brown garments that surprised my mother upon my return and me for breaking away if only a little from my love of standard black.

In my mid-twenties, I started taking fewer photos of muted faces in black and white and more photos of food, dipped in gloss and drenched in color. It was apparent through time that brown did not hold well in still life and could rarely come alive aside from molding itself into the egotist of brown food, chocolate. For the simplest and most delicious of brown foods, sauces included, I would have to learn to make them shine; to garnish with parsley, with julienned shallots, with cheese tuiles.   

But brown dishes are not the only thing I learned to eat voraciously while shielding my mess of a plate from my scrutinizing camera lens.

I am yet to photograph a bone-in shank that looks appetizing and a while back, I struggled with coconut milk mussels before getting a shot that would flatter them with their quivering soft insides, a tell-tale sign that we may not all be beautiful on the inside.

Some foods shine on their own and excel under a macro lens while others struggle, pleading with you to place them on a layered table setting with a few star props in natural light. When photographing your food for others, it is imperative to do some organization for it is never a picture-perfect snapshot moment, even when it’s the most vibrant of red velvet cakes.

Find your grandmother’s detailed silver spoons and old cookbooks to place in the background, even tattered pages and parchment paper work to give your photo some depth. Consider your surroundings and learn to work with them. You will find that you need not an awe-inspiring place to work in; just some stable sunlight, a reliable camera, a simple dish and your imagination.

Chosen as Gourmet Live's Image of the Week May 9, 2012

Double Blueberry Cake
You’ll need:
1 cup of self-raising flour
100 grams of butter
2 eggs + 1 egg yolk
1/2 cup of sugar (You can reduce this to 1/4 cup)
1/2 cup of fresh blueberries
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

For the blueberry sauce:
2 cups of frozen blueberries
½ cup of water
½ cup of sugar
2 tablespoons of lemon juice
The zest of one large lemon
2 tablespoons of cornstarch + 2 tablespoons of water
½ teaspoon of vanilla extract

Begin by creaming the butter and the sugar in a stand mixer until completely blended and fluffy. Add the eggs and egg yolk and mix again for 30 seconds. Add the flour gradually, allowing every ¼ cup to incorporate into the batter before adding the next ¼ cup. Scrape the sides of your bowl every now and then to make sure everything goes in. Pour in the vanilla essence. In a separate bowl, toss the blueberries in some extra flour until coated then add to the batter. This will allow the blueberries to hold their place avoiding having them pool at the bottom of your cake tin. Add to a small greased loaf tin. This is not a big cake and is meant to finish quickly in both prep work and eating time. Pop your cake into the oven at 170 degrees Celsius. There is no need to preheat. Allow the cake to bake for approximately 45-50 minutes (until a knife comes out clean). When done, remove from the oven and allow to cool for 10 minutes before extracting from the tin.

Blueberry sauce: In a medium-sized saucepan, combine the blueberries, water, sugar and lemon juice on medium heat. Stir often until it comes to a low boil. In a separate bowl, stir the cornstarch into 2 tablespoons of cold water until dissolved. Gradually stir the cornstarch into the blueberry mixture. Simmer on medium-low heat and stir every so often until the sauce has reduced and is thick enough to coat the back of a metal spoon. This should take around 7 minutes. Take the sauce off the heat when read and stir in the freshly grated lemon zest and vanilla extract. If you’re using vanillin, stir it in when adding the cornstarch. Feel free to add more sugar; some blueberries are not as sweet as others. To thin out your sauce, add in a few drops of hot water at a time and stir until you reach your desired consistency.

A Virtual Potluck with Gojee

Have you been on Gojee before? A while back, I had spotted it and was so excited at the prospect of screen-sized food photos at the touch of a button that I was on it all the time. Getting a little more engrossed, I decided to get in touch with the great team behind Gojee to see if I could contribute. Veronica emailed me, informing me that they weren't looking for new contributors. Oh, the heartbreak.  

A while later, Veronica contacted me again telling me that they've accepted my recipes and that my blog was now included. Happy day! Today, Gojee is hosting a potluck that I can't be there for but Veronica asked me so kindly to join the fun in Gojee's virtual potluck. 

Starting on Thursday, January 26, check out other potluck dishes fellow gojee contributors shared. Go to gojee.com and enter "gojeepotluck" into I Crave. You can also follow #gojeepotluck on Twitter. This is my contribution. 

One last bit of niceness to Gojee before I go: Gojee has now been nominated for "Best Design" at the 2011 Crunchies. I wish our wonderful team plenty of luck, hugs and food to keep the anxiety away. I can honestly say I'm very proud to be part of such an exceptional group of people who spend time, money and effort to bring homemade food to the world.

Basterma Pasta Bake

As featured in The Daily News Egypt

You'll need:

4 cups of pasta

100 grams of butter

110 grams of basterma

2 long red Italian onions, sliced

¼ cup of all-purpose flour

2 cups of full cream milk

½ a teaspoon of whole-grain mustard

½ cup of heavy cream

2 egg yolks, beaten

½ cup of Mozzarella cheese

½ cup of Cheddar cheese

½ cup of Parmesan cheese

salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 175 degrees Celsius. In a large pot, cook the pasta until it's tender but undercooked. Drain and set aside. In a medium-sized pan, pan-fry the basterma in a drizzle of oil until it changes color and becomes slightly crispy around the edges. Keep the basterma fat that has melted in the pan on the side to use for later. In the same pan, melt 50 grams of butter and saute the onions over medium-low heat for approximately 10 minutes. They should have started to slightly color but should remain soft. Remove from heat and set aside.

In a medium-sized pot, melt 50 grams of butter. Add the basterma grease you previously reserved and add the flour. Whisk constantly as it cooks for around 1 minute. Add the milk and cream and cook for 3-5 minutes or until it begins to thicken.

Add salt and pepper and turn your heat down.

In a separate bowl, combine the egg yolks with 4 tablespoons of your bechamel-like sauce. Stir quickly then pour the egg mixture back into the sauce. Let it combine for a minute. Add the cheese and stir. Once the cheese has melted, add most of the basterma and onions and mix. Keep some on the side. Add the pasta and coat it all with the sauce. Tip your pot over a baking dish and pour your pasta mixture. Sprinkle with the rest of your onion and basterma mix and bake for around 20-25 minutes. Serve steaming hot. 

Combat Gloom: Sunday Brunch

Dear Malaysian rain,

You are so inappropriate. You're like this manipulative woman I know. She pretends to bring the sun with her and makes everyone giddy for around 10 minutes (I think it has something to do with the jiggle factor and boisterousness). The minute you cozy up to her - BAM! - she rains on your parade. With you, Rain, it's just... literal (except that there's no parade, just long walks in my case). My editor and ex-client are currently babbling on Twitter about sunny breakfasts in Cairo and an Egyptian dish called Sharkasiyya (which I am yet to make - recipe please, Heba) and all I can think of is you and how you ruin all my plans. See, it would be nice to have brunch outdoors or even on the balcony but you keep us locked inside. Unless you live in a desert or in the Hindi movie, Lagaan, I don't know why anyone would ever use the idiom "right as rain". So today, I shall not give in to a prolonged spell of bad spirits. I shall instead pretend that my beloved albeit cancer-giving sun is out and I shall see it in the face of every sunny-side up I make until it comes back and becomes the light of my life again. Until then, stick it where the sun don't shine. :) 

Homeshackled,

Happy is the bride that the sun shines on      

P.S. Another reason why I dislike you is this - When I take a photo in color, I expect it to be in color. You make everything look black and white or just a random shade of gray. You can find a serious column about eggs written by pretentious columnist me if you continue below - published on Saturday, July 9th, 2011. 

For the most part of my life, I ate eggs prepared one way – brown and rubbery. According to my childhood-commandeered specifications, they had to have almost no bounce and should come together so that I could no longer see flecks of singled out egg yolk. I cringed at the thought of seeing them separated and didn't take to the idea that egg yolks could ooze onto the other elements already beautifying my plate.

On the other hand, the thought of green-tinged stiff yolk would have me discarding breakfast all-together and the thought of eating eggs without a side of bread was unacceptable. Naturally, bread was used to mask the eggy flavors and feed my growing carb addiction.

But today, I'd like to make a public apology to eggs; not for eating them because I'm heartless like that, but for underestimating their value in my little world of food. Only after making hollandaise, sabayon, mayonnaise and crème brulée all using egg yolks that I once condemned did I begin to realize that I had done eggs a great injustice. I had shunned them in their simplest, most unscrambled form. Shame on me.

On balmy, wet weekends, I like to work with whatever I have at home to disguise it as “brunch” on that languid morning. The practice usually leaves me scorning my sarcastic self as the meal in creation unfolds into something worthy of being called brunch.

It came to me as I was cracking an egg one Sunday, a thought that many take for granted. I should take the leap and eat, without hesitation, a sunny side up, involving its sinful runny yolk. My husband was doing it. What's standing in my way? Besides, it would come with the added benefit of using one pan. Childhood specifications should be abolished when it comes to food. You're old enough now, I thought, almost aloud. Get over your whiny self.

It was after overcoming this precise trouble that I let loose. Only then did I force away my involuntary “no thank you” that instinctively pops up when trying new things; concerning food that is and not roller coasters.

I can happily say that I can no longer count the number of runny egg yolks I've embraced. Filling cakes, pastries and souffles (both savoury and sweet) with air, lending a worthwhile base to sauces, giving custards their richness and meringues their shells, I don't know how vegans manage.

Besides, I couldn't manage living in Asia without embracing their egg-loving culture. I would be laughed out of the country. No joke. Malaysians add eggs to so many of their dishes that I cannot ever recall going out for one type or another version of local food and not finding at least one egg incorporated into someone's dish, whether cooked or cracked raw onto the dish, disguised or in clear view.

Here you can have sweet and sour eggs for breakfast or you can opt for Thai “Son-in-Law Eggs” with tamarind. I still can't find someone to explain to me why they're called that. There's also stir-fried shrimp omelettes and scorchingly hot egg curries.

You'll find eggs in soups, sweet egg tarts, dumplings, and spicy crab sauce; or openly flaunting themselves in entirety as a salted egg adapting an ancient method of preservation using salted charcoal going hand in hand with its sister, century egg (pi dan), that allows the yolk to reach a dark greenish grey color and the egg whites to turn a translucent jelly-like brown. Now do you understand why I would be laughed out?

While I make sunshine-inspired brunches in the rain, here's an idea for a summery breakfast by the beach that will take you to the closest mini-market for the ingredients, assuming you don't have this stuff lying around already. If you're in a bigger city, try sourcing out some good Egyptian sausage for this. It'll work its magic well but don't skip the chili and don’t use bread. Instead, shock your sleepy taste buds awake and teach your children to accept heat in the morning. They'll need it when they travel later on in life to pursue yoga in India or a party in Bali.

Spicy Brunch for Two
You'll need:
4 eggs
2 handfuls of wild rocket
3 medium potatoes, cubed (any kind will do. No fuss.)
2-3 bird's eye chili, sliced finely (depending on your tolerance for heat)
4 Vienna sausages, split length-wise and sliced (You can use anything else. That's what I had lying around.)
1 small red onion, diced
2 scallions, sliced
1 handful of parsley, chopped
A splash of olive oil
A walnut-sized piece of butter
salt/fleur de sel and freshly cracked pepper to taste 

Set a pan on the stove and allow it to reach medium heat. Drizzle with olive oil and add the onion and potatoes. Leave to cook for around 10 minutes. Add the sliced sausage, scallion and chili and continue to cook for another 10 minutes. Turn up the heat in the last 3 minutes to scorch the edges of the potatoes and sausage. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle with chopped parsley. In a separate pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Break open eggs into the pan and immediately reduce your heat to low. Cook slowly until the whites are set and the yolks begin to thicken.

Serve up two eggs per person atop the spicy potatoes and sausages with a side of fresh wild rocket. 

I can't believe I spent years of my life not eating eggs like this. Liquid gold.

Done.